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Carlos Sainz questioned whether the battle got a bit personal between Max Verstappen and George Russell at the 2023 F1 Azerbaijan GP sprint which led to the incident.
Sainz was right behind the two drivers and kept a keen eye in case anyone made a mistake. While the two drivers did not make a mistake, the contact between the two did damage Max Verstappen's race.
Talking about the incident to RacingNews365, Carlos Sainz gave his take as he felt things might have gotten a bit personal between the two drivers. He said:
"I had to take avoiding action more than anything else. There's no space. I nearly caught them both. They were very aggressive, and it looked like they were taking it personally at some point because it was a bit all over the place for them."
Max Verstappen did end up finishing the sprint in P3 but what was quite evident was the damage on the Red Bull driver's car. Because of the damage, he was unable to challenge either Sergio Perez or Charles Leclerc ahead of him, further fueling his discontent towards George Russell.
Christian Horner gives his take on the Max Verstappen vs George Russell incident
Christian Horner gave his take on the Max Verstappen-George Russell incident as he felt that maybe the Mercedes driver was over the limit in turn 3.
Talking about the incident to Sky Sports F1, the Red Bull boss said:
“From what I’ve seen. Turn One I could live with, Turn Two was hard racing between two hard racers. The bit that for me that felt a bit over the top was Turn Three. At Turn Two, George is trying to leave enough space but it’s a very tight corner and that’s where the damage to the sidepod was done."
He added:
“At the next corner, George pushes him too far into the wall. Unfortunately, the result of it was quite a lot of bodywork damage and that cost him quite a bit of performance. When you see a hole like that it’s got to be three-quarters of a second a lap at least, maybe more."
Max Verstappen will be starting the main race on the front row and with George Russell expected to start the race in P11, the two drivers are arguably not going to get involved with each other this time around. It will, however, be interesting to see how Verstappen approaches the first-lap battles from now onwards.
